First Test of WordPress Automatic Updates

I’ll admit, the idea of WordPress hooking into my server and updating itself is nerve wracking. I get what they are trying to do, which is why I’m going to try it out. They want to increase the security of self-hosted blogs by patching them as soon as possible and not relying on those of us who like to live out here on our own servers to patch them when we get around to it.

Hey, I travel a lot for my job, I know how this can happen, even if you’re trying to stay updated.

They are just expanding one of the benefits of using their hosted WordPress.com platform to those of us using our own servers. Of course, those of us who host the sites ourselves, usually do so, so that we can have more control over it.

I’m intrigued by the idea of WordPress patching itself. I think from a security standpoint, it’s a great idea. But I’m also scared to death about what happens if the update goes bad. Is my site broken until I can get in and fix it? Is that more, or less, of a risk than me not getting an update in a timely manner and my site getting hacked? I’m not real sure, but I’m counting on WordPress to have worked out the kinks in their own environment before rolling this out to the rest of us.

Still, for tonight, maybe I’ll backup just in case? What about you, how do you feel about this new feature?